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Published: June 19th 2012
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Our final shore excursion was to the port of Zeebrugge, an industrial looking town on Belgium’s coast. It had been two long days at sea since leaving Helsinki, which had passed by with much ease. Long held plans to complete activities and attend lectures and shows while we crossed the last of the Baltic Sea and entered the North Sea had not come to fruition. In fact if truth be known we filled our time without doing much. Reading, watching movies and the designated eating seemed to make the time just fly by. I have come to like cruising because of this fact – you just don’t have to do much if you don’t want to. Stay in your cabin, read a good book, sit up on deck, watch the world go by – no one really cares. The activities are there but there is no pressure to do; love it.
We have been to Bruges numerous times and we really enjoy it. It is another chocolate box style town with cafés, restaurants and many touristy styled shops that line the many waterways and medieval buildings. We had to get the shuttle buses this time as you were not allowed
to walk on the port area alone. The buses took us to a town called Blankenberge and from there we got the train to Bruges. It was a cheap trip as the man in the ticket office gave up early as half the cruise passengers started to queue in his ticket hall. He made a snap decision and calmly passed the problem onto someone else – namely an unnamed and equally unseen ticket conductor who obviously felt he could not be bothered to wander around sorting tickets on the train either. So no one came near us. One nil to the cruise passengers.
I could never tire of the walk into Bruges. It is stunningly beautiful and takes you through many of the old cobbled streets. We had usually been on a WW1 tour of the area when we stopped off here so it was quite nice to be sans students. It is a city steeped in history and the famous city of Ypres, the Menin Gate, and Flanders Field are but a short drive away. Many of our fellow cruise passengers had headed to these areas on shore excursions for the day. We used the large spires as
our landmark and soon we were within the city square. You pass many chocolate shops, which I am only too pleased to avoid but I have known for a long time that there is no point trying to stand in Narelle’s way. What we saved in unpaid train fares was soon back in the Belgium economy as large quantities of the local delicacy were bought.
We wandered through the streets before we met up with Mum and Dad to do what we had set out to do. It was ‘moules frites’ time. We found a lovely terrace restaurant that overlooked one of the squares and ordered the large pots of mussels in wine and washed it all down with a couple of glasses of very cold Belgium beer. It is a great way to eat - straight out of the pot, shells steamed open and a lovely broth at the bottom; add to that some nice fries and mayonnaise to soak up the beer. They are certainly not the large NZ green-lip mussels but they are equal in taste and when you have about 60 in a pot I am glad that they are small. It was just what
I wanted and set us up for the walk back to the train station. Back through the streets we went along the canals and through medieval styled gates – it really is the most enchanting of towns.
Back on board we prepared for our final night and I went up on deck to share a pint at the aft of the boat. It was to be our final sailaway and I wanted to watch Zeebrugge disappear behind us. I got talking to a man who had just experienced his first visit to Flanders Field and visited many of the Commonwealth War Graves. His emotions were still very raw and he kept saying how much the visit had affected him as his father had been shot down in WW2 whilst flying a Lancaster bomber – a father he had never met. I felt that the Flanders visit had nearly been a test to see whether he could make the pilgrimage to his father’s grave. He was still unsure he could; telling me that if he was this emotional in front of graves of people he did not know what would he be like in front of his father’s grave. There
must be thousands of people in similar circumstances and it is interesting how this area is still an emotional draw to so many to share in family and world history.
So with this in mind I stood at the aft of the ship and toasted Belgium with a good pint of English Boddingtons and off we sailed to our final port and disembarkation in Southampton. The suitcases had already started to appear in the corridors and by 6pm ours were out and gone not to be seen until we were off the ship the next morning. It was another fantastic piece of organisation, which all seemed to run seamlessly. There was one more visit to the Meridian Restaurant to have another amazing meal. We have been spoilt with the meals and also by our waiter Menon who never missed a beat and for whom nothing was too much of a chore. He seemed completely in control and made our dinner times a delight. I will never cease to be amazed how they fed everyone on the ship – there was never any sign of panic and their ability to feed 400-500 people in one sitting was nothing short of
incredible. As a farewell gift they presented each table with all the menus of the cruise – I may need them for legal reasons when my doctor does my next blood test.
I cannot fault the cruise. We had the best of times and, as with our time in New York and Washington with JD and Max, it was nice to share a special trip with Mum and Dad. I have been sworn to secrecy on some of the cruise stories but let’s just say that there was a lot of giggling at times and I have some great tales for future Christmas Day lunches – they need no embellishing. It was two great weeks and as much as we enjoyed the shore excursions we also loved all the MV Arcadia had to offer. It is not often that you can dress for dinner on a regular basis (four Black tie dinners in 12 days), watch a movie in a ship’s cinema, attend West End style shows every night, eat 24 hours a day, find new cocktails, or if you are so inclined just lose yourself and watch the sea pass by from the comfort
of a deck chair. It was bliss.
By the time we woke up in Southampton our Baltic Cruise was over and all too soon we were on our way to collect our car and head off to Brighton. We had seen a lot, shared a lot, visited six new countries, and witnessed new things. When we did leave the ship we left with only good memories.
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